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Ford Moves to Boost Electric-Car Sales

Critics like Ford's Focus Electric, but few have sold so far. Photo credit: Ford Motor Co.

Ford's (NYSE: F) Focus Electric is a pretty nice electric car. It has decent range for its price, it drives well, and most critics have been impressed by its overall execution. But it's selling in tiny numbers: only about 1,600 since it was launched late in 2011. Tesla Motors (NASDAQ: TSLA) sells that many car every few weeks.

Part of the problem is the price: Compared with rivals such s Nissan's (NASDAQOTH: NSANY) Leaf EV, the Focus Electric is expensive -- about twice the cost of a regular gas-powered Focus. Ford just announced a price cut, but will it be enough to jump-start sales?

In this video, Fool contributor John Rosevear looks at Ford's electric car in the context of the company's overall green-car strategy, and he gives his thoughts on whether this price cut is likely to help the Focus Electric's sales -- and on how much that matters to Ford.

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The trouble with everyone is that they pretend they can still afford to pump $100 worth of gasoline and drive too much! We are a nation of gasoholics! They drive as if they aim to bankrupt the government . Look at Detroit as a starter... Our economy is still unstable because of unstable oil prices. We want to grow our economy but cannot . Higher oil prices will hit us after we try to grow our economy again. We are stuck. the only way out is to drive less. If you dont like EVs, fine, just drive less. There is no way around except if you are rich enough to pay any price to fill up your tank. Rich people still can afford to pay as much as $500 to fill it up. What about you? Rich people dont care about you . Sure, some rich people care by buying EVs, of course! Kudos to them! Not all of them. Look, money managers still invest in oil stocks. So go figure. They are betting on our total ingorance! History repeats, repeats and shalt repeat !

Ford can borrow from Henry Ford the founder. He said choose any color as long as it is black! Ford can just build a million Focus Electric all in black and ship them out to all dealers and see what happens. Go for broke... there is no future in oil ! None ,whatsoever! Oil is finished ,kaput! Big Oil is really hard at work trying to squelch out any competitors that make EVs. Goldman Sachs is helping Big Oil ! Americans is facing a very stark choice! Oil or Electric now or else!

Look , electric bicycles only got 20 miles range.. Who is complaining ? Buy Electric Focus now. Ten years later, you will be back buying a better Electric Focus with longer range. You can count on it, pal!

Lithium mining companies already found more lithium , but they are waiting to make sure that more of us buy more electric Focus. It is expensive to develop a mine and it requires several years of permits and regulations to do so. Dont be caught dead with $8 gasoline! Look at Europe! Do you want America to be like Europe and $8 gasoline? Sure, President Obama can add taxes on gasoline to encourage Americans to buy electric Focus. It will be unpopular , of course. Does Americans need to be pulled around by their nosrils with bull rings?

Government can push for more electric vehicles , but the trouble with this is is that Government is not great at picking right manufacturers . It is best left to consumers (car buyers). Look at solar companies that makes solar panels some very low efficient ones.. Govenment push them all while the best ones are not as successful as the lousy ones with lousy low efficient panels. who likes low efficient panels?? Wall street or REIT companies who are only interested in owning the land not the solar panels so they chose the cheapest lousiest solar panels to put them on land for 20 years then remove them and develop real estate. we will lose solar energy 20 years later like we did with solar water heaters , remember ?

I have a Civic Hybrid with a 160,000 miles. Gets 45 mpg. Needs a new battery but the $3000 cost will negate all the fuel savings. Electric's battery is at least twice as costly as a hybrid's.

Economically speaking, nobody touting an electric should be making any claim about saving money over gas. Environmentally, electricity has to come from somewhere that is probably not carbon neutral or pollution-free. Hybrid cars will help attain the economies of scale necessary for future movement to electric. However, electric is not ready for prime time.

Econ, if everybody drives a Civic , then you may be slightly right at best. Fuel savings will be greater as gasoline rises in the future. We already pay one trillion dollars more for oil goods every year simply becasue oil jumps from $50 to $100 today. When oil hits $200 which is VERY likely in ten years. we will be coughing two more trillions a year. A penny wise today will become a brainwash tomorrow!

Econ, not everyone is getting 45 mpg.. you are just a egomanac when it comes to fuel efficiency. You forget that most dont give a whit about efficiency. Those guys are making things worse for our economy.. so please quit preening your own feathers !!

Ford doesnt make potlicial statements.. Ford makes cars that people wants. if people dont want electric Focus in enough quantities , then we have a really major problem ahead. Simple as that. Some people want to keep Big Oil going and keep paying dividends and to heck to the rest of America!

There is a real urgency to dump Big Oil stocks, yet everyone is hesistant about doing it.. You hesistate, you lose big elsewhere. Big Oil may survive but not without a godawful lot of economic causalities lying around in the future. Big Oil has no choice to keep producing enough oil that people demand. It is people not Big Oil that lead the economy. If people want to lead with mindless gas fillings, fine, our economy will be dumped ! We will be stratching our heads as we look at four lane highways left unused !

If there is no bright future in oil, then Ford can simply say so.. Ford can say to the world that oil sucks! Bad, bad for our economy! Oil keeps on getting bad and worse every year! More pollution! More EPA regulations every year! Republicans want to repeal regulations. Republicans love oil too much to be any good for our own mother country! Republicans is addicted to oil! Bad Republicans! Very rotten Republicans!

Lets unite and get America through the Great Oil Hangover! We must do it! It is a long delayed MUST! We can start mass protest against Big Oil and make demands that greedy Big Oil start subsidizing Ford to make electric Focus and F-150. Deny free enterprise to Big Oil! Big Oil is anti competitive! We must downsize Big Oil ! Big Oil is not too big to FAIL! Big Oil must FAIL! Oil stakeholders must lose shirts! Make them cry ! So lets do it, huh?

ICE vehicles leak oil, gasoline, etc on the pavement then it rains ... There it goes down the drainage system and out into the rivers, bays, oceans. Bad bad really rotten bad! Republicans , take notice! Electric Focus and F-150 will not require oil changes nor will they leak oil, gasoline ,etc down the drain system at all. Good , good wonderful!

Ford EVs won't sell any more than Teslas even if they are a lot less pricey--not everyone has a place to plug it in. The bourgeois Greenies all are rich enough to own houses where there's a garage with that outlet over the workbench they can plug into for a recharge. As for the rest of us (the condo & apartment bunch) the Greenies say we aren't really "people" anyway, so why should we have cars in the first place?

FordRules, you dont understand Oil! If Ford doesnt start electric in any big way, then Ford will not be able to sell as many gas powered cars as now. The rich will be the only ones still able to afford $10 gasoline or they will drive Teslas. The rich will snub Ford Electric Focus, of course. So Ford has no choice but to go big on electric Focus and electric F150. Ford will have to convince that electric F150 is the way to go or many contractors driving ICE F150 will go out of business from $10 gasoline anyway. Big Oil never intends to produce more oil or gasoline to lower prices. Big Oil needs Ford to stay with ICE , no dice! The rich will lose money on oil stocks . We will be driving electric Focus or electric bikes. Oil is finished! Our economy cannot support gasoline prices as they are today because Helicopter Ben is pumping money to support gasoholics directly.

Ford loses billions in Europe , why? $8 gasoline over there. When $8 gasoline hits America, Ford will be gone , bye bye! Ecoboost engines is not going to save Ford at all. Natural gas is not going to save Ford. Electric can . Teslas has to be beat in the race toward cheaper electric cars. Ford has no choice but to follow and more importantly... beat Tesla to the Focus and F150. I dont care about how people feel about battery life today. I will just hightail and disappear !

I like the idea of electric BUT unless I have a roof that has enough space to put solar cells to charge it when I'm at home or a wind turbine to charge it, it's not very green.

My problem with electric cars is that despite their economy, they cost more than gasoline powered cars over their lifetime. The big killer is battery replacement. The other killer is range. I can fill my 21 gallon fuel tank on my SUV for around $70. That will take me around 400 miles. In other words I can drive a good long way. I have a girlfriend 125 miles away from me. I can drive there at 65mph in about 2 hours. I could not do that with an electric car.

I just read about the new 265mpg Volkswagon. That sounds great until you realise it has very narrow tyres. By the time you've gone a very few thousand miles, you're due for new tyres.

It seems that there is yet no really inexpensive and worthwhile solution. Perhaps if we could convert gasoline or gas directly to electricity without needing an internal combustion engine then we might be onto something. Until then our internal combustion engines are the least expensive method of transport.

As far as green is concerned... where's all the electricity coming from to power electric cars? Fossil-fuel powerstations or nuclear powerstations, perhaps?

Look before you buy this car is having all kinds of issues the most recent for me is the stop safely now error where the car just shuts down in traffic with little time to pull to the side of the road. The dealers have been unable to pin point the problem. Ford knows about this problem but is doing very little to solve the issue. When someone is killed then they will take note I'm sure. Just go to the forums and see how many people are having this issue and others.